The Tombs
The Tombs - a series of photo collages exploring the historic tombs and funerary design of 19th century New Orleans and southern Louisiana. Beginning around 1800 in this region stonecutters from Europe, Latin America, New England, and the Caribbean constructed above ground tombs in neoclassical styles based on Greek, Roman, and Renaissance architecture. These craftsmen and architects - Parisians, New Orleanians, Creoles, enslaved men, and free men of color - incorporated the forms and proportions of classical buildings into small burial structures resembling miniature temples and Christian chapels.
As a result of New Orleans’s increasing population, geography, and religious traditions these tombs were built a little more than a foot apart. The overwhelming density in these walled cities of the dead along with added vases, memorials, and plaques have rendered many of them almost unnoticeable today.
In this series I have digitally extracted the tombs from their overcrowded environments; removed names, dates, and modern additions; altered colors; added historic iconography, and placed them into non distracting backgrounds of collaged daguerreotypes. Recontextualized, my hope is that the remarkable architecture, classic design, and exceptional materials of the original tombs can now be fully realized and appreciated in these pieces.